Scripture

One day last week after a long suffering bout where I had felt like I was dangling over a deep canyon and just the tiniest error on my part or a soft whiff of wind would send me plummeting into the deep and… end, many confusing thoughts and swirling emotions gripped me. It was a […]

Inspirations

I have had more excruciating suffering bouts the past week but I won’t distress you with them. What good would that do? You know what I’m going through and how I cling to my Savior and Healer. I am thankful that joy adamantly adheres to me in spite of the suffering, a staunch ally against […]

Testimony

Like any other testimony of God’s wonders and grace, whether a major one or of the everyday kind, this story began at the deepest end of human emotions: weariness, anger, resentment, lostness, helplessness. Of hope flying away; faith groping in the dark; heart bordering to rebellion. Against God. A body and heart that have been so […]

Life Lessons

Even as I cling to this, that to be wholly God’s is the whole meaning and purpose of life, I still intentionally pursue it with a single-minded determination through the moments of everyday. I mean, it could easily wriggle out of one’s grasp like a slippery fish. And there are moments still that it’s hard […]

I fret when things other than the Lord Jesus Christ occupy my thoughts and time most of the day. I feel that it is a great shortcoming and failure on my part, and in my list of “major offences” against God, those two are lined with “sin”. Maybe unlike most Christians, I am very fearful of God. I still haven’t learned to not connect my sickness and suffering with God’s punishment or chastisement. Often, I still think that my suffering intensifies because I might have offended God in some way (although sometimes I can’t really think of any, unless God is uber-sensitive like that). I know that you think otherwise. I, too, cannot totally believe that God is hovering over me, just waiting for me to slip and then – boom! The punishment comes. I cannot really believe He works that way, yet, it surely feels that way when the sting of suffering grips me.

So, I am fearful of Him, so much so that I cower in my spirit and when I haven’t behaved perfectly, I actually beg Him to not punish me. But I do not want to go back to those beggarly feelings or living like an adopted-and-unloved child, because I’d been there and it just isn’t true.

Instead, I respond to this fretting and fearfulness (or in other words – conviction) by listening well to the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ and praying more agonizingly. And most of all, I strain to find ways to please Him and worship Him whatever I do during the course of the day.

Well, to be honest, I fret because there are bad habits I have not yet completely forsaken. Bad habits and weaknesses that trump my resolve to “behave myself wisely in a perfect way, to walk within my house with a perfect heart” as David had declared. There are times I still fall prey to them.

opening my cellphone to check messages and IG (a quick browse) first thing in the morning

my mind dwelling on vain thoughts while waiting for sleep to come at night and back to them in my waking moment

feasting my eyes on things of this world (especially online), even as simple as a pretty teacup

planning, devising (like in home decorating), and round and round it goes

I may live a sedentary life and most of it in bed, but my mind is always active and busy 😀

With the exception of the first two, the activities I listed above are not bad. But when they worm themselves into my mind more than necessary, and especially during worship service (via live streaming on my laptop), that is bad. They then become distractions, a word I’m becoming to hate more and more everyday.

And the worst thing? When they consume my thoughts, affections, and time. Suddenly at the end of the day, I realize I have wasted my time with vain things, worldly things that don’t really matter to the Lord and eternity. Then, I fret. I get sad and soul-heavy.

I guess I am more prone to such habits or “thought life” because of my situation. I don’t go out (because I can’t). There are very limited activities I can do beside reading, watching, looking, painting, writing, praying, AND thinking. The painting, writing, and reading I cannot do any time I want. I need to wait for strength and comfortable breathing to be able to do them. In the meantime, I browse online. Browsing and looking are my easiest ways to pass the time. But when I am unable to do even those, I keep still and close my eyes. Then, things play in my mind, some are spiritual, some are not.

I don’t want to live this way everyday. I want to be always in the presence of the Lord, yes, even when I am doing something that is not spiritual. I believe this is possible when I don’t let my worldly activities and thoughts and plans consume me. Consume is the key word. When we let things other than God consume us, then they become sin. This is the thing that Apostle Paul mentioned in Colossians 3:5:

Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry. (Col. 3:5)

Inordinate affection. Inordinate is defined as “1. disorderly, unregulated 2. exceeding reasonable limits: immoderate”*. We should not develop inordinate affection to worldly things. Temperance or self-control is the operative word. It’s not as if I shop and shop online with no care about the price or their necessity. No, not at all. But, for instance, I like collecting vintage or used teacups and I buy them from local IG sellers. Yes, I like looking at them, collecting them, and using them for tea, but I don’t really buy the expensive ones. I only buy the cheap ones. Yet, I feel guilty and fret sometimes because I delight in them and I think about them and they make me happy.

I don’t want to border on covetousness, no matter how simple the things I want to have and enjoy. I always endeavor to live simply, although my heart longs for beauty.

Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: 29 for our God is a consuming fire. (Heb. 12:28-29)

God should be the One filling our hearts and minds and not the things of this world. The prayer I whisper every time I find myself being pulled away by my worldly desires is this: “Lord Jesus, fill my heart and mind and days with Yourself that I would be so full of You!” There is a need for intentional and diligent seeking of Him. If we want to be nearer to God, then let’s intentionally draw near to God, for when we do so, He draws near to us. So, I tell myself, “Just do it. Make ways to do it.”

What my soul desires is to worship Him until I should have touched the throne of grace and He should have touched me that I am transformed. And healed. For that to be always my goal.

In my life, it’s my weaknesses that vie for my deep and constant devotion to God, those weaknesses that bring us fleeting thrills. Indeed, there are endless distractions that pull us away from a connected worship of God. In the course of the day, we go through many things, both the needed and the desired, the essential and the exciting, but they should not consume us, they should not occupy more territory in our minds than what we give for the Lord – thinking, meditating, worshiping, and delighting in Him.

The principle behind this is what the Apostle Paul meant in 1 Corinthians 7: 29-31:

But this I say, brethren, the time is short, so that from now on even those who have wives should be as though they had none, 30 those who weep as though they did not weep, those who rejoice as though they did not rejoice, those who buy as though they did not possess, 31 and those who use this world as not misusing it. For the form of this world is passing away. (1 Cor. 7:29-31)

Those who buy as though they did not possess. Those who enjoy the things of this world, however simple and innocent, as if they did not enjoy them. It’s like that, right?

Because we are all “looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13).

*From the Merriam-Webster Dictionary.

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When I wasn’t yet a born-again Christian, my work was my passion. It was what defined me. My name was synonymous to it. My world revolved around it, not only because it consumed much of my time, but it also consumed my heart and mind. There are many things in this world that can possess our whole beings and consume us, without us ever realizing it (though there are also people of the world who seek to be consumed by their own passions and be swallowed whole by them). But even the people of God are not immune to such passions.

I’ve been thinking much about it lately, that when we become passionate about things that steal our time for God, both in our hearts and minds and in our deeds, these things become idols to us. What could we be so passionate about that would dilute our fervent devotion to God? I can think of many things: work, business, relationships, hobbies, pastimes, material possessions, and yes, even the talents God gave when used inordinately. In the authorized King James Version of the Bible, a part of Apostle Paul’s letter to the Colossians reads like this:

Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry. (Col. 3:5)

I also thought about covetousness as the source of idolatry and analyzed that covetousness doesn’t only mean excessive desire of possessing worldly things, but also other things which we might not have given much thought, such as coveting the world’s admiration, or people’s approval, or men’s love and attention, or visceral happiness and sensual pleasures, etc. I looked up covetous in the dictionary and it is defined as, “marked by extreme desire to acquire or possess, for example, covetous of learning.”

One morning last week as I praised and worshiped the Lord, I was suddenly caught up in a strong desire to cry out to Him, “My Lord Jesus, be my life’s passion! Be my heart’s greatest desire!” I begged Him as He pried open my heart, saw what’s in there and whispered, “Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love” (Rev. 2:4).

I pray that my deepest desire is to be passionate about Jesus. For He is ever passionate about us, though we have yet to grasp its depth. We just have to think about the cross, examine His words, and look at His works and enduring mercy in our lives, and we would know that God is passionate in His love for us.

May the Savior Jesus Christ be our deepest hunger and the only One who can satiate it. Listen, for He may just be knocking at your heart’s door and whispering, “I have somewhat against thee.”

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It is my hope and prayer that this place, where like a drink offering, I pour out my heart and soul through words, will be a place where you find comfort and refreshment for your spirit. May you "meet" the Savior here and leave blessed, in any form that you need His blessing. View my complete profile.